


cut it out and then restart

by Ruby_Wednesday



Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fluff and Smut, Gen, Halloween, Haunted Houses, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-30
Updated: 2017-10-30
Packaged: 2019-01-26 11:38:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12556572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruby_Wednesday/pseuds/Ruby_Wednesday
Summary: The dead can't hurt you,Damen told himself, again. Spending the night alone in a haunted house, however, might just kill him.





	cut it out and then restart

It was just his fucking luck that the night was dark and looking like it was about to be stormy. OK, all nights were dark. Unless it was summer in Iceland or whatever. But it was still pretty early on Halloween night and the clouds were whipping across the black sky. Damen pulled his fleece over his head, then grabbed his parka from the back seat just in case. 

If he was going to last the night in Marlas Villa, the most haunted house in all the land (or at least this district), he needed warm clothing. He also had a flask of whiskey in his back pocket. Another in his backpack, which he checked one more time. Supplies still present and accounted for : torch, phone, powerbank, back-up powerback, mobile wifi stick, matches, camera, charger, snacks, water. Check, check, check.

And in his front pocket, a photograph. In his wallet, an emergency muscle relaxant he stole from his step-mom.

What more could he need?

Oh yeah, balls of steel. 

Hey, he’d never backed down from a challenge before. Damen didn’t care that he was on the cusp of being too old for these dares. Or that it was stupid, possibly illegal, and he was missing all the good parties and the girls in skimpy costumes and inhibitions loosened by the spirit of the season. He was going to spent the night here. He was going to win.

The gate was already open, creaking ominously, and the overgrown garden littered with empty bottles and other questionable items that indicated some local teens had partied here recently. Presumably they had lived. So that was a good sign.

Alternatively, there were a bunch of dead bodies waiting for him beyond the door. 

Fun stuff.

Damen wasn’t scared, not really. Not yet. There was a difference between fear and adrenaline and he was coasting on the latter. The door opened easily, like someone had oiled the hinges recently, and Damen stepped inside the house. 

“I’m here, bitches,” he said, into the front-facing phone camera. No point in executing a dare if you don’t offer up proof. Looking back, Damen wasn’t quite sure how this had happened. There had been a boozy lunch at the club with Kastor and some family friends that were now exclusively Kastor’s friends. Talk of spooky shit and other dumb challenges. Ouija boards. Bloody Mary. The stuff of pre-teen sleepovers attended by girls called Ashley and Jessica who wanted to know if their favourite internet star would ever reply to their tweet. Damen was old for this shit. But he played along with his older brother and he sure as hell wasn’t going to let them call him a coward. 

Marlas Villa was legendary to anyone who grew up around here. It wasn’t always empty. When Damen was a kid an old man lived here, Boo Radley style without the twist. He was a literal creep, some old uncle that embodied all the worst things you’d ever associate with an old uncle. The newspaper boys left the paper at the end of the drive. One of the many ladies who hung out with Damen’s step-mom drinking wine in the middle of the day said that her current housemaid once took a job at Marlas and the old uncle had humiliated her. There were other stories, too, about mysterious disappearances and night-time shrieking and flashing lights and yeah, sure maybe they could have been explained away by a living creepy dude but he was dead now and the rumours only increased.

Ghosts. Demons. Co-incidence.

Call it what you want but Damen was going to investigate. He could deal with being haunted, if it meant his brother saw he wasn’t a kid anymore.

Plus, other reasons. 

He’d done his research.

He was optimistic.

The only thing was : no-one tells you what you are actually meant to do in a haunted house once you get inside. Movies show it in montages. Damen nearly wanted a ghost to start some shit right away. What? He bored easily. He thought about exploring before it got too late but the dare hadn’t specified anything of the sort. Thanks to a visit to City Hall he knew the layout of the house already. So he made his way to a remarkably plush living room and had a quick look around. It was shabby, dusty, but you could tell it had once been created with care. The wallpaper was thick and expensive and the furniture was solid, and several generations old already. There were actual sconces in which to place his Ikea candles and once they were lit, the flickering light was nice in it’s own way. Like you were in a different time. Damen yanked away the dust-sheet on the biggest chair and made himself at home. Nikandros didn’t answer when he called and there was only so much scrolling you could do, so Damen opened his sudoku app and started to play.

It was almost like being in the old dorm common room, except less self-righteousness and guitar strumming. Just a guy and his game in a space that wasn’t his home. Anyway, Damen had the ability to focus on his current task and tune out all the rest. That’s what made him good at sports and studying and sex. It’s what made him bad at listening to what his ex-girlfriend was saying while he watched television. So, now, he could ignore the rattling pipes and whistling wind and growing sense of impending doom. The dead can’t hurt you. 

Dead people may not even WANT to hurt you, how about that? 

His hand went to his chest, to the picture, but he didn’t take it out. You were supposed to wait until midnight or whatever. It was probably bullshit. He’d probably get nothing out of this but free drinks for the rest of the year at the club. 

Still though.

He was on edge. 

His heart wasn’t racing but it would if he let his nerves go wild. Damen had learned at a young age how to control fear, then channel it into the thing that made him capable. You didn’t win fights or ace tests by letting fear overcome you. Whatever, he couldn’t sit here like an old man at the doctor’s office all night. He closed his app, sent another pic to the group chat, and cautiously got to his feet. See, there was a new noise coming from the back of the house and it was kind of freaking him out. Another thing he had learned at a young age was how to be aware of your surroundings. Hunting. Orienteering. Hiking. His dad was big into the outdoor life and he had respect for the few parts of the world they couldn’t control. Kastor was the same. When Damen was, like, twelve his brother had brought him into the woods and abandoned him there. It was a challenge, nothing more. He was old enough to find his own way home. 

So Damen knew noise. He knew the difference between the clicking of a mouse (animal not computer) and the padding of a wild dog. He knew when a house settled or when someone put their foot on a step of the stairs. Right now, he wasn’t quite sure what he was hearing. This house was old. Abandoned. Whole fucking colonies of animals could be here. Or homeless people. Kids. Other idiots like him. As careful as if he was stalking prey, Damen made his way out of the living room. The sound he heard was…rustling, which didn’t tell him very much. It could be a pile of papers by a drafty window. Could be a raccoon. Could be the local psychopath making a skin suit.

Or something else. 

He had his phone and torch in one hand, but both were dark. He had to keep the other hand free, in case he needed to defend himself or catch his balance. For now there was enough light from the world outside to guide his way. Through an arch was an old formal dining room, thankfully empty. Not that he sighed with relief or anything. He wasn’t a wimp. Above the dining table, Damen could just about make out an intricate old oil painting rendered in browns and reds. As an art lover, and someone who could never help themselves, Damen turned on his flashlight for a better look. 

Yeesh. Damen had grown up among wealth and dined in plenty of opulent places and hunted as a boy but this painting was downright grotesque. It featured a man in red, on horseback, skewering a boar with a long spear. That wasn’t atypical among old money creeps. What was disturbing was the blood, the agony of the animal, the distress of the horse, and the look of elation on the bearded man’s face. Damen turned off the torch. If he knew anything, it was that there would be no happy family meals in the shadow of that monstrosity.

Moving on, he got closer to the rustling. Closer, he heard other noises too. Breathing, but that was his own and it was louder than usual. And a strange kind of…distressed mumbling.

Damen swallowed, hard.

He hadn’t really thought this through. 

He started to record, Blair Witch style. It made him feel less alone. The closer he got to the source of the noise, the more stupid he felt. He wasn’t afraid of anything. Even if there was something there…what would it mean?Nothing. The dead can’t hurt you. Nothing could really hurt Damen so badly that he couldn’t cope. A ghost? More like a nuisance. 

That’s what he told himself as he came to the end of the hall and the first open door in the house. All the others had been shut. All the rooms had been dark. But there was a sliver of light slicing the darkness. It did not flicker. Damen was thinking about how embarrassing it would be if this footage was shaky as he took the last step towards the open door. 

Once, he had stood with his back to a cliff for a whole hour, in the wind, without showing any physical distress. In college, he had stood in silent protest for hours over a locker room issue. He thought the coaches gave in just to get him to go away.

But that was then. This was now, weird now, and he had to go forward. The door glided open and there, in the sickly light, Damen saw a specter of a shape. He froze. No. No. But blinking didn’t make it disappear — this thin creature with white hair dusted with cobwebs, a flowy white shirt loose on an angular body, old-fashioned boots, an open mouth and  
bright blue eyes that would put the Night King to shame.

Damen’s mouth had fallen open and for once in his life, he couldn’t think of any smart ass thing to say. 

“What the twisted fuck are you doing here?” spat the ghost. “You’re trespassing on private property. Get out right now or I’m calling the police.”

Oh.

Okay.

Damen took that in. He moved very slowly, trying to communicate that he wasn’t any danger to anyone. 

“Do…” He began, carefully. “Do you maybe not know you’re…you know.”

“Oh, Jesus. What are you on? I really don’t have time for this. Is it a bad trip? Or is this your usual…state?”

“I don’t do drugs,” Damen said, defensive. Wait, why was defending himself to a — to an angry, living, breathing young man touching a very real file under the light of a thoroughly modern Maglite. 

“I don’t care,” said the not-ghost. “Get out.” There was an edge to his voice that nearly made Damen obey. 

“I can’t,” he replied.

“Are you defective in some manner? Turn your clod-hopping feet back the way you came and leave through the front door.”

“No.”

“This is my property.”

He sounded convincing enough, except Damen had zero reason to believe him and plenty of experience of jumped up little punks who used arrogance to make others jump to their attention. 

“It belonged to some creepy old man,” Damen said.

“Yes. Past tense.”

“You bought it.”

“I sold it. And I need— never mind. Get out.”

“I can’t.” The not-ghost looked like he was about to fling the nearest sharp object at Damen’s eye. They were in some kind of study or office. Even the lamps had sharp edges.  
There was definitely a letter-opener on that fancy desk. “It’s a dare,” he explained. “My friends…my brother, actually, dared me to spend the night here on Halloween. So here I am. Don’t make me leave. I don’t like losing.”

Not-a-Ghost sighed. “I actually couldn’t care less what you do.”

He turned his back and resumed his frenzied rifling. There were a lot of filing cabinets and lots of drawers. He seemed to be in a hurry.

“Can I help?” Damen said. Not-a-Ghost snorted. “Is that a no? I can move some of those boxes for you. Oh, is that desk drawer stuck?” The blond guy was fumbling with something. “I’m Damen,” Damen said, partially just to get the other dude’s name and have something proper to refer to him as. 

“No, you may not help. I am not that weak that I need you to do my heavy lifting. The drawer is not stuck. It’s locked.” 

“And?”

“And.” One dusty fair brow shot up.

“What’s your name, sweetheart?”

“Go fuck yourself.”

“Ah now,” said Damen. “You must hate your parents for naming you that.”

“My parents are dead. And my name is Laurent.”

“Nice to meet you, Laurent.” Damen had decided Laurent (he had the name of a ghost!) was trying to scare him off (rather like a ghost would) and therefore Damen would not fall for it. 

“Hold my torch,” Laurent replied.

Hmmm. 

That was like something a non-corporeal being would say. 

“Is that euphemism?”

“Yes, by torch I mean hold that open flame. Pick up the flashlight, idiot, and shine it here. I need to get into this drawer.”

Damen did as he was told. 

Damen NEVER did as he was told.

He mused on this as he angled the light so Laurent could fiddle with the lock using what appeared to be an actual set of lockpicks. That would have been impressive, if Laurent knew how to use them.

“Want to swap?” Damen offered.

Laurent ignored him.

“Seriously, do you know what you are doing?”

“Would you just stop talking and let me concentrate?” His voice had gone high and his cheeks were flushed. Laurent was sober and not on a dare and even Damen could deduct he was distressed. “I can do this. I’ve done it before. I can do this.”

“All right,” Damen said. Laurent continued with no success. Damen decided to give him five more minutes. That was a long ass time to hold a flashlight just so but not really a long time when you had a face like Laurent’s too look at. Laurent was gorgeous, nearly too gorgeous to be human. No wonder Damen had been confused, eyes that bright and lips that full and face that perfect belonged to another world. Not this one. Laurent’s mouth was parted in concentration. His teeth gleamed in the light. His eyes flashed. Damen’s hold on the torch wobbled. “Sorry,” he said.

“Doesn’t matter.” Laurent pushed away, clearly frustrated. In case there was any doubt, he swept a whole mess of papers off the desk along with an already cracked lamp. It shattered.

“Wait,” said Damen. “What’s so important about that drawer anyway?”

“Nothing. You wouldn’t understand.” Laurent leaned against the desk, with his weight resting on the heels of his palms. “Just some pictures. It was a long shot anyway.”

It wasn’t a _just_ if it upset him this much.

Damen thought, again, of the picture in his own pocket and the real reason he was here. The room was a mess. It had been a mess before Laurent had arrived and there was nothing here he could feasibly use. So, onwards. 

“Hang on,” he said and re-commenced his exploration. He sent a couple more snaps to the groupchat. He rattled stiff kitchen drawers and rifled through a storage closet. 

Eventually, in what his step-mom would have called a solarium, where plants had turned to mulch and the glass was caked in muck, Damen found what he needed. 

A crowbar.

“It’s locked, not jammed,” Laurent said, scathingly, when Damen returned.

“No shit.”

“That won’t — work.” 

It worked. Damen was strong. 

The drawer popped open and Laurent dived onto the contents like it was some long buried treasure. He discarded some documents, tattered letters, bills. His eyes were darting  
and focused as he assessed each item and dismissed it. Damen thought he would have just ploughed through with no plan but Laurent was different. At the very back of the drawer, in a nondescript brown envelope, Laurent found what he was looking for and clutched it to his chest.

He hadn’t been lying. It was just an old photo and Laurent was holding it like it was the most precious thing in the world. The sheer relief on his face made Damen’s emotions swell. 

“Thank you,” Laurent said, without lifting his head. “It’s the only one left. I thought…never mind.”

“Anyone could have done it,” Damen replied. Which was true. It was desk drawer in an abandoned house, not Fort Knox. He was used to smashing things open but had the crowbar failed, he was going to Google that shit. There was a kid in their middle school who would open any locker with a couple of paperclips and Damen was way smarter than him. 

Laurent was hunched over and Damen was taller anyway, so he had a clear view of the treasured picture. It wasn’t ancient or anything. No more than twenty years old. Two boys, both with blue eyes, and fair hair. One golden. One platinum. They were smiling the kind of smiles so genuine they beam out of the picture. The kind of smiles that tugged at Damen again, because his brother only smiled at him when he made a joke at his expense.

“Brothers?” Damen guessed, gently.

“My older brother. Auguste. He died when I was thirteen.”

“I’m sorry,” Damen said.

“Thank you,” Laurent replied, stiffly. “I’ve had plenty of time to get used to it. I thought…never mind. Anyway, I have it now. I’ll be going.”

“Oh,” said Damen. “You’re not waiting for…”

“Trust me. The less time I spend in the hellhole the better.”

“You’re scared?”

“I didn’t say that. After all, the dead can’t hurt you.”

“You think it’s haunted?”

“Not in the way you do,” Laurent said, with a wry smile. “How old are you anyway? Too old for dares, I wager?”

“Something about…” Damen trailed off.

“Go on.”

“My older brother dared me. There’s something about Kastor that will always make me feel like a kid. Sorry. I know…”

“It’s fine,” Laurent said. “If it’s any consolation, a strong, happy young man like yourself has nothing to fear here. Or ever, I would imagine. Stay. Win your bet. Just be gone before  
the workers come in the morning.”

“If it’s not haunted, why are you tearing it down? I’ve looked around,” Damen said. “There’s so much potential for refurbishment. It could be lovely.”

“I’m not interested.”

“Did you ever live here?”

“I’ve stayed here,” Laurent said. “When I was younger.”

“Any ghosts?”

“No.”

“They say…” Damen felt silly now. “They say you can talk to the dead here. It’s Halloween. The barriers between our world and the others are thinnest tonight. People have  
believed that since forever.”

“They’re wrong,” Laurent said. “Hold a seance. Be my guest. I’m leaving.”

“But —”

“Shut up.” Laurent said this, without looking at Damen. His eyes were all on the drawer and something he had missed in his earlier examination. A letter. An earring. They meant  
nothing to Damen but Laurent looked like he had seen a ghost. His hands shook as he retrieved them. The earring was the same shade as his eyes. The letter was hand-written and crumpled and Laurent skimmed it with a growing look of horror on his beautiful face.

Then he fled.

“Wait,” Damen said. Unthinking, he reached for Laurent’s wrist to stop him. He couldn’t just let someone run off so upset. (And maybe, just maybe, he wanted to touch him. To see if he was real. To feel that warm satin skin under his own.) 

“Don’t touch me!” Laurent jerked away. “This isn’t a thing. I don’t give a fuck about you and your dare. Rot here for all I care.”

Damen halted and stayed still, watching Laurent leave. The fear was gone from his body. All that was there now was shock and dread.

-  
The encounter with that strange young man, who wouldn’t have been out of place in a Gothic horror, at least had the positive effect to eliminating Damen’s trepidation about the house being haunted. The villa was empty. Damen was alone. Yes, there was a bad atmosphere but it was because of the legacy of a creepy old man and family secrets and the raw pain that radiated from the apparent owner Laurent. So Damen explored, fascinated by the architecture and the furniture. He’d wanted to study design in college but his family had pushed him towards business instead. It made perfect sense. He was going to inherit the company some day, after all. His father said it would have been fine for a daughter to study something so flimsy but a son needed something more solid. And Damen had been in company and he smiled along with the sexist comment. Besides, what were more solid than buildings and homes? 

Damen explored, passing the time until midnight, with a creeping sense of despair about the contents of this old house. It wasn’t just a hoarder’s paradise, it was the history of generations and generations gone by. How did that guy Laurent not see value in that? Family was important. Damen loved hearing stories about his ancestors and learning about their achievements. How could a person know where they were going if they didn’t know where they had come from? In one room, Damen found a grand piano that was not beyond repair. In another, a collection of women’s hats that to his untrained eye would have been all the rage in the nineteen thirties. He passed through an imposing master suite and into what he assumed would be a walk-in closet but was actually a child’s room with an un-made bed and a Nintendo DS gathering dust on the pillow. Weird. The model was too recent for it to have been Laurent’s as a boy. Moving on, he found a small sauna that was a tacky new addition to this home. The en-suite bathroom was worse. The taps were actually (plated) gold.

Damen didn’t like it here and couldn’t find anything suitably creepy to photograph. He wasn’t talented enough to translate extrema claustrophobia with his phone and a few  
words.

Besides, it was nearly midnight. He went back down the winding staircase and collected his supplies. He didn’t really know if it was necessary but hey, why not go whole hog when you were a grown man carrying out a childish dare on the night of the year when he should really be getting wasted and making out with a girl in a sexy costume. The glass-walled room where he found the crowbar seemed the best place and Damen meticulously cleared a space and lit the thick white candles. They little flames flickered off the dirt-caked glass so that you could catch, here and there, that there was colours underneath. Once, this room had been beautiful. 

He took solace in that, as he sat cross-legged on a faded Persian rug. He remembered the careful way Laurent had held his photograph from the desk. Gently, Damen took his from his pocket and laid it between the candles.

He closed his eyes. 

“Hey, mom,” he said.

Then opened his eyes again, feeling like the world’s biggest idiot. But it was difficult for him to look at the picture. His mom died when he was born, so if he’d seen her face he’d been too small to know anything. There were pictures of course, that he’d pored over with the fascination normally reserved for his craze of the week as a boy. Later, Kastor’s mom had taken them down and he stopped taking out the memory box. Boys don’t do that kind of thing, his father has said. Cry. And Damen felt, illogically, that he was invading her privacy by looking too much even now. 

He took a long swig of water. 

He tried again.

“Hey, mom,” he said. “Sorry. Is that weird? I know no-one called you that when you were here. I think it would be weirder if I said Egeria. But this is already so weird. Are you there? If you’re there, can you show me?”

He paused, hopeful, waiting for a sign.

A sharp draft blasted through the space and two of the candles guttered.

Damen’s heartbeat spluttered.

“Oh. Ok. Great. Hi,” he said. “It’s, um, me. Damen. Your son. Did you pick the name or did Dad? No. Don’t tell me. I don’t know if it’s like three wishes and they’ll run out. That was a stupid question. I … I don’t really have questions.” He looked around again. Maybe his mom would have something to say to him. How would he know? “I’ll just leave this here.”He pushed a Sharpie and pad to the middle of the rug. “Oops,” he said. Then popped the cap off the pen.

“You don’t have to say anything,” Damen continued. “It’s not like I would recognise your voice. And I might have a heart attack if the pen really started moving. I just…it’s not a just. It’s never a just. I’m so confused. I hate working for Dad. Everyone treats me like a demon child. They are afraid of me and they dismiss me. Kastor’s deals are so shady. All Estra cares about is where her and dad will go on their next cruise. He had a health scare. Maybe you know that? What if he dies. How does the afterlife work for first wives? I was seeing this girl and it didn’t work out and whatever, I’m not hurting for dates. But I keep seeing her name on Kastor’s phone. This is a dare but to him it’s a prank and I don’t know…I don’t know. I don’t know anything, really. I’m lost, Mom. I’m so lost.” 

When Damen heard his voice crack, he stopped. This was stupid. This was so stupid. 

“I’m talking to myself, right?” he said, coming to his sense.

“Not exactly.”

It was Laurent.

Damen’s face was hot as he whipped around. “Enjoy the show?” he seethed.

“Oh, stop. I — No. You’re right. Sorry. I shouldn’t have eavesdropped. I didn’t know what to say.”

Damen was still reeling from the embarrassment. He was talking to himself. Laurent opening the door was what made the flames go out. He was a grown ass man executing a juvenile dare because his big brother goaded him. Because his big brother didn’t want him around tonight.

“Why?” Damen said.

“I came back to…warn you,” Laurent said, ominously.

“That’s not at all creepy,” Damen replied.

“You should leave. I’ve talked to my lawyers. They’ve informed the police. I don’t think they’ll come tonight but…you don’t want a trespass charge on your record now do you?”

“Police?”

“Did you really think you could talk to the deceased here?” Laurent asked. He walked differently than before; confidently. Damen shrugged. “I should apologise again. That’s probably my fault. I used to do that, when I was younger. I exaggerated to some neighbourhood kids. You know how rumours get started.”

“You…talked to dead people?”

“I didn’t expect them to answer me. My brother died, I told you that. I was lonely.”

“Here?”

“Why not? He doesn’t have a grave to visit. I didn’t have anyone else.”

“Did…you said you sold it?” Damen said. “Am I stopping you?”

“From talking to my dead brother? No. I’ve outgrown that. Although I do think he’d like to hear what I found tonight.”

“But this house has had a bad rep forever…” Damen tried to calculate the years. He was slightly older than Laurent. He had heard stories about Marlas since before his brother would have died. “Long before you lost your brother, surely.”

“My family have been twisted forever. Except Auguste. He died. I’m sure parents did warn their kids to stay a way from here but not for supernatural reasons. He was sick, in later years. People thought it was dementia but that wasn’t the case. A boy fought back. Nicaise. He owned that earring I found. He hit my uncle over the head with a paperweight and left him with brain damage.” Laurent said this with a proud smile on his face. “He’s in law school now and a very dynamic student activist. It’s scary. We’re paying for it. You look shocked. Don’t. I am very generous. As for the other stuff, wait until you hear what was in the letter I found?” The smile turned rueful.

“I’m sorry you were born into that,” Damen said. It was clunky but true.

Laurent shrugged. “I had a very good brother. You on the other hand, need to watch your back. I’ll ask my lawyer. He can advise you and put it on my bill.”

“I have money,” Damen said. He didn’t need charity. He may not be as close as he would like to Kastor, but he certainly didn’t need legal advice. They’d work out the business stuff. Damen would earn his respect. 

“Yes. I saw your car. But I owe you for..opening the drawer. I was about to give up.”

“You don’t.”

“Believe me, I dislike feeling indebted to people. Let me settle this.”

Damen wasn’t in the mood to argue. “Whatever,” he said. “I’ll get my stuff together before the blue lights and sirens.”

“Come on, Damen.” It was the first time Laurent had said his name. “You have money. You know they won’t be so indiscreet.”

“I’ll get my stuff.”

Laurent crouched down on the once-luxurious carpet. “Don’t forget this,” he said.

“Thanks.” Then, in case he thought Damen was careless with the photograph. “It’s just a copy. I have others.”

“She’s very pretty. Nothing like you.” Like he was teasing. Then continuing before Damen could give his stock reply of how he looked more like his father. “My uncle burned all my pictures. He paid someone to delete all my hard-drives. This was before the cloud. I didn’t know. You’re lucky to have the memories.”

“I don’t,” Damen said. “She died when I was a baby. I just have photos.” The air was heavy with human misery. Nothing supernatural. Just good old regret and grief. “This could be a really nice space if it was restored.” Small talk. He could do small talk. He was good at making people smile. “The glass is intact. It’s probably really pretty under all the grime.”

“You can tell?” Laurent said. Damen had stopped looking at the dirty windows. Even in the dimmest light, Laurent’s eyes flashed like glass in the sun. 

“I’d like to find out.”

“I’ve canceled the demolition team,” Laurent said. “For now.”

He seemed reluctant to leave. Damen was reluctant to stay. He couldn’t look at the Ikea candles without embarrassment. He couldn’t believe he had tried to…do that. He was meant to be smart; meant to be strong. 

Shit. He was meant to be winning a bet.

“Well, I better tell my brother the bet’s off,” Damen said. 

“Unless…” Laurent’s whole face lit up. “I’m the legal owner. You’re my friend. It’s not a big deal if you’re here whenever the cops come. You could do better than winning a bet.  
Did I see a camera in the front room?”

“Yeah.”

“Get it.” Laurent was pulling off his jacket. “Then get the toiletry bag in my car. And the dust sheets from the music room. You’re gonna do better than staying the night here.  
You’re gonna show your stupid brother a ghost.”

“You don’t —”

But Laurent was enjoying himself. Damen could tell. 

“This is how you pay your debt to me?”

“Sure. Why not?” Then, to himself. “Now where was the hat collection? We need feathers, don't you think?”

Damen was smiling as he fetched the stuff, even as part of him was wondering why he was playing errand boy while Laurent was fussing with bedsheets and broomsticks. But it was clear, also, that Damen was better suited to heavy lifting while Laurent had a flair for the dramatic. He played an excellent ghost and the best part was, through it all he was laughing and Damen was laughing, too.

When they’d gotten the shot that should surely cement Damen’s status as ghost hunter and bad ass extraordinaire, and it was well into the witching hour. Laurent’s face was still animated and Damen had drank two cans of Monster and two shots of whiskey. Laurent had commandeered his whole back-up flask. He took long swigs without flinching and the only impact it had on his face was a slightly more languid gaze. 

“I thought I was going to alternate between sulking and brooding all night,” Laurent said, wiping away some makeshift facepaint. He meant, obviously, that Damen had gone along with his scheme and distracted him from the darkness of the discovery in the drawer. Damen was dying to ask him what the letter meant but he didn’t know him well enough. Also, Laurent reminded him of one of those moody cats who would hiss if you tried to hard to pet them. 

“I thought I was going to alternate between playing sudoku on my phone and potentially pissing my pants in fear,” Damen admitted. “We’re even, I guess.” He looked down at Laurent, who was standing at full height gazing up under his gossamer eyelashes. Damen’s chest tingled in a place deeper than flesh or bone. “You’ve got —” With the back of his hand, ever so softly, he brushed one last cobweb out of Laurent’s hair. 

He saw the blood flood into Laurent’s cheeks.

It was too soon and too stupid considering all that had gone on that night. Breaking into a haunted mansion, and unearthing some secret that was clearly a crime, a failed séance and a staged ghost sighting. Grief. Laughter. If you thought about it too much, it was farcical.

But Damen had been lost and Laurent was here like an anchor.

The worst that could happen was rejection, and he had survived an outburst already 

Damen lowered his head, slowly. When you’re standing close, gazing at one another, feeling every breath; it takes forever to close the distance. Damen was careful, considerate and he didn’t want to spook his new friend who he had originally assumed to be a ghost. Hopefully, they could be more than friends. Laurent was not moving away, not his body nor his intense gaze.

Damen closed his eyes. 

And Laurent, without warning, kissed him sweetly on the mouth. It was unsure, almost chaste, and Laurent’s body was trembling. His lips were soft. The joy of mouth meeting mouth, the taste and the pressure, for the very first time was enough. There was no need to push, or deepen, or draw Laurent’s body to his. Damen let Laurent take the reins, control the angle and the extertion. He was contest with running his fingers through Laurent’s silky, dusty hair. Damen was smiling as he pulled away sooner than he would have preferred, conscious of not pushing Laurent too far. 

“I know a diner,” Damen said. “They’re open twenty four hours and they do amazing pancakes.”

“Are you talking about IHOP?” With a breathy laugh. “Literally everyone knows IHOP.”

“No,” said Damen. “It’s not IHOP.”

“Maybe we could check it out so. I have a sweet tooth. The syrup better be good.”

“I await your judgment.”

Laurent’s expression shifted. He became serious again. Or he had just remembered what he had done. “When I walked in here tonight, I kept telling myself one thing : the dead  
can’t hurt you. Only the living.” He let out a long breath. “I’m leaving thinking something else.”

Damen nodded. He felt it too. “Like no-one can hurt you ever again.”

“Yes,” said Laurent. His bright smile was enough to make you breathless. “Now take me for pancakes. We can edit these pictures and start our plan how to get revenge on your brother.”

“Don’t you need to wait for the police?”

“No,” Laurent said. "I'm ready to go."

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Spooky Season, you guys! Just something quick and fun.  
> The title is from Shake it off by Florence and the Machine. find me on twitter @ruby__wednesday or tumblr @ruby--wednesday for more au ideas that i don't have time to write


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